Those who have been following my long winded efforts to build my model railway may remember that I lifted all the trackwork following a failed experiment in securing both the cork underlay and the track using spray adhesive. The warm weather saw expansion which resulted in track lifting and the cork bubbling. As the track had not been pinned the adhesive didn't prove up to the job.

So reluctantly the whole lot was lifted and I decided that I had to start again. Well the starting was delayed until recently when I received the last of the major pointwork items required. All pointwork has been made by Hayfield and he has been good enough to share some of his work on his own blog.

This time around I have adopted a much more old fashioned method. Cork underlay has been glued down to the baseboard using PVA glue (and copious amounts of it. The cork underlay is 4mm thick and came in a huge roll bought of a certain internet auction site. It worked out quite cheap compared to buying the usual stuff sold specifically model railways.

The layout, which had been designed using Templot (when you still had to pay for it), was printed out onto slightly heavier duty printer paper and then glued on top of the cork using wall paper paste.

The track abnd pointwork was then laid on top of this. Each peice of track has had drop wires soldered to it and these will then be soldered to the bus wires which will be under the layout. My previous layout have always suffered from terrible running quality and I think in part this has been caused by reliance on fishplates for electrical connectivity.

I hope that with each separate piece of track having its own supply this will to some extent be ameliorated.

Almost all the track at the North end of the station has now been relaid, with just a couple of bay tracks and platform 1 (or is it 12) to be laid.

Next will the South end (under the Great Western Hotel) which thanksfully is somewhat simpler.

Then starts the process of dusting off my old DCC controller and starting to attach power and point motors (i'm trying to buy 10 each month just after payday).

My thoughts are also turning to the storage facility. I've swung between a traversr ( decided not to) a traditional fan of sidings and a casette system.

Currently I'm thinking a mixture of traditional fan and casette may be the answer. My thought is to have the fast lines run into a fan of sidings where the crack expresses can be kept. The slow lines would then run into a casette system where the suburban trains and freight trains could be kept.

Well enough words here are some pictures.

Here is the station looking towards Paddington. From left to right we be through line (platform 12 and 11), two bays (platforms 10 and 9), through line (platform 8 and 7), two avoiding lines (up and down), through line (platform 6 and 5), two bays (platforms 4 and 3) and finally through line (platform 2 and 1). Although the station has been compressed it is still possible to get two trains onto the through platforms and the scissor crossings in the middle allow trains on the central platforms to cross each other.

The bays are large enough for five or six coach trains if necessary - so you can see why I am desperate for Hornby to bring out some non-corridor Western coaching stock.

a view striaght across the station throat.

and now looking towards Wolverhampton (which I think I shall rename Worford for the layout).

Although you can't see it in the background by the large tub of PVA glue are the four running lines (slow lines on the inside of the curve - the fast lines on the outside). The pointwork is such that any train arriving on a slow line can access any of the platforms and all four bays. Any train arriving on the fast line can access the main through platforms and the bays at platform 10 and 11.

In reverse trains heading out this way can all leave by the slow lines and trains from platform 10, 11 and 5 and 6 can leave by the fast line.